


polygraph

by aspidocheloner



Category: Protean City Comics (Podcast)
Genre: Alternate Universe - I do what I want, Canon Divergence, F/M, First Kiss, Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-23
Updated: 2020-02-23
Packaged: 2021-02-28 01:47:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,293
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22865803
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aspidocheloner/pseuds/aspidocheloner
Summary: Marcus has learned how to tell when Sage is lying to him.(Marcus and Sage get coffee together on a Saturday.)
Relationships: Sage Prince | Penance/Marcus | Gild
Comments: 4
Kudos: 6





	polygraph

**Author's Note:**

> Written after Issue #99. This is entirely self indulgent, and was written for the #PCCFicJam of 2020 <3

Marcus wakes up on a Saturday morning at six o’clock sharp to a peacefully quiet home. Rosy rays of sunlight are just starting to filter through his blinds, cutting across the room and casting clean, sharp shadows on his sparse furnishings. It’s pretty. The transition from living with the Appointed to living with the Asset and Alina had been strange, and it still is, but in a gentler way. The longer he goes without the Appointed, the less he misses it. It seems like distance makes the heart see clearer.

He stays in bed as the hours slowly trickle by. Around seven, he hears the Asset get up and make coffee. The older man always tries to be as quiet as possible, but Marcus’s room is right by the kitchen. It’s okay, though. He likes to hear it. He likes the evidence that he’s not alone. That was the one thing that he’d always miss about the Appointed: the never-ending company. Marcus likes the quiet, but he hates feeling lonely. It’s part of the reason he’s so grateful to Alina and the Asset; not just for taking him in, but for the way they quickly made him feel welcome.

At 9:32 A.M., Marcus’s phone buzzes with a text from Sage. He desperately ignores the way his heart tries to flutter. It’s simple, just a cheerful ‘good morning!’, but he’s learned that nothing about the way he reacts to Sage makes sense. He texts back immediately, then shakes himself for being so dull—who just says _Morning_?—and so quick. It doesn’t seem like it matters to Sage, though, because two minutes later, she responds with an offer to get coffee at Cream and Sugar’s together. If he looked in a mirror, Marcus is sure that he’d see smoke pouring out of his ears. Thoughts race around his head. Is that a date? Friends go out for coffee. It’s probably a friend thing. Sage and Alina go to Cream and Sugar’s together all the time. It’s probably not a date. But what if it is?

He manages to reply with a “Sure!” before burying his face in his pillow and resigning himself to the fact that Sage Prince will be the end of him.

A couple hours later, he’s sitting on the couch, bouncing his knee, while Alina sits on the armchair across from him with a knowing smile. He wonders what she knows, because he hasn’t said anything. Maybe Sage told her? Would Sage be talking about this? He’s starting down that spiral of thought when there’s a knock at the door, loud and clear.

“That’s for you, right?” Alina says, quirking an eyebrow and rather pointedly not moving from her chair. Marcus makes a face at her as he stands up, and she’s laughing as he walks down the hall to the door.

When Marcus opens it, he feels his heart skip that telltale beat. Sage looks as pretty as ever; her hair is pulled into pigtails, and she’s wearing a soft, oversized sweater. She smiles up at him, pulling her hand down from where it had been poised to knock again.

“Hi,” Marcus says, like an idiot.

“Hey,” Sage says, and her voice is like music to his ears. “Ready to head out?”

“Hm? Oh, yeah. Um. Let me grab my coat.”

Marcus ducks back inside, covering his face with his hands as soon as the door is shut. He doesn’t need a coat. It’s nice outside, and he has metal skin. He runs upstairs anyways, grabbing his jacket and his wallet, and when he passes by the living room he pops his head in and tells Alina he’ll be back later. She nods, and then he’s back at the front door. Sage smiles at him again when he opens it and steps out, and for the first time he notices the motorcycle helmet under her arm.

“We’re taking the bike?”

“If that’s alright with you,” She chirps back, holding the helmet out to him. Marcus realizes with a start that it’s not _her_ helmet, but the one that he’s supposed to wear. It’s the same sleek black as hers, but this one is larger, and patterned with shiny chrome hearts.

“Is this the helmet you give all your guests?” Marcus jokes as they walk down the sidewalk. Sage pulls on her helmet with a bright laugh that makes it hard for him to breathe.

“Oh, no,” She says with faux seriousness, conspiratorially, filled with silly, joking dramatics, “I got that one just for you.”

Marcus freezes, staring at her with the helmet half-lifted. They’d gone through a lot, some of it together, but most of it on opposite sides. He’d learned how to tell when Sage was lying, even jokingly. Most of the time it was just an aspect of life. Right now, however, it was life-changing, because Sage wasn’t lying. She’d gotten the helmet for him, specifically. _Sage had bought the helmet for him._

After a couple moments, Sage turns to look at him, and he’s sure that if her helmet was off he’d be looking at a brow furrowed in concern. Marcus shakes his head and puts the helmet on. When he finally mounts the bike after her, he carefully places his hands on her shoulders, leaning as far away as possible out of respect.

When they pull into the parking lot ten minutes later, Marcus is glued to Sage’s back, arms wrapped tightly around her. He leaps off the second they’re parked, watching Sage’s shoulders shake with laughter as she takes off her helmet.

“It takes _fifteen minutes_ to get here from the safehouse,” the metal-skinned boy points out as they walk to the coffee shop.

“Not if you drive fast!”

“You mean speeding.”

“Aw, that’s such a harsh way to put it. Do you think I’d break the law?”

Marcus opens the door, and looks at Sage with raised eyebrows. Her face flushes, and the girl raises her hands in acquiescence as she steps through into Cream and Sugar’s.

“Alright, that’s fair. I get it. What are you getting?”

“Oh, probably just a hot chocolate. I’m not big on coffee.”

Sage nods, and steps up to the counter. Marcus watches as she orders, first, a large hot chocolate, and, second, a sickeningly sweet monstrosity of a drink that he’s not even sure contains coffee. She pays for both.

“Wait, did you just order for me? What is this, a date?” He teases while pulling his wallet out of his pocket.

At that, Sage turns to him, sticks her tongue out, then smiles. “Maybe,” She responds, matching his light tone, batting his offered money away and turning back to the cashier to drop cash into the tip jar. Marcus’s world is reshaped again, as, for the second time in a day, Sage Prince isn’t lying to him when she should be. He follows her to wait for their drinks in a daze.

“Soooo,” Sage drawls, “How’s living with Alina and the Asset?”

“It’s nice. Still weird, not living with the Appointed, but I’m getting better at it. My therapist says that I’m making good progress.”

“I’m glad! Y’know, if you really miss the whole ‘sharing your space with a lot of people’ gig, you’re always welcome at PCOY. Penny keeps asking when you’re going to come help her with her math homework again.”

“Gosh, Penny. She’s such a good kid.”

“She is, isn’t she? Whatever she ends up doing, she’s going to be great at it.”

_She’s got a good role model,_ Marcus thinks, remembering Night Owl and vivid purple magic and the strength to ask for help. He almost says it, too, but the barista calls out their order and Sage grabs their cups before he can. They end up settling at a table by the window. The afternoon sunlight is warm and golden as it dances across the table. Sage looks pretty, with her dark hair shining in the light and her sweater bunching around her wrists. She always looks pretty to Marcus.

They sit in comfortable silence for a few moments. It’s pleasant. It’s easy. Then Marcus breaks it by asking, “Why did you ask me to coffee, Sage?” He doesn’t know why he does. It’s not until he says the words that he realizes how much he wants to know the answer. The question settles in the air between them like smoke—it’s a real, tangible thing. It’s heavy. He feels the tone shift; what had been light and joking was now serious.

He watches Sage’s expression flicker, sees the emotions play across her face. She doesn’t hide them, and the reel of confusion-nervousness-determination is entrancing. Sage has always been like that, for him, from the first confusing moments against Ms. Devilis to sitting down in a diner to here and now, in a coffee shop, with sunlight streaming in.

“I guess you wouldn’t believe me if I said I just wanted to see a friend,” She says, pausing to look at him for confirmation. Marcus nods, and she sighs. “We haven’t ever been on the smoothest path. I know that. Hell, Sorceroct broke your legs because of me. I know that I’ve lied to you a lot. I don’t regret that, because it was important for me to lie to you. It was necessary. But I regret that it had to be you. Some part of me wishes that when we first met I didn’t have any ulterior motives, that we’d just been two normal teens.”

“We weren’t, though,” Marcus points out. His heart is beating faster. He knows where this is going—where it can’t be going. He knows that Sage hasn’t lied once. She laughs, bittersweet, and continues.

“You’re right, we weren’t. We were, and are, teenage superheroes, and that makes things infinitely more difficult. I asked you to come to coffee because I… I like you, Marcus. I think you like me too. I like talking to you. I like freaking you out when I drive too fast. And if someday we go on a real, actual date, I think I’d like that, too.”

“You’re not lying,” Marcus says, in a state of disbelief.

Sage looks at him, frowns, green eyes dark, “Of course I’m not.”

“I can always tell when you’re lying, now.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, um. It’s useful. And, Sage? I hope that someday is soon. I’d really like to go on a date with you.”

She smiles, beams, brighter than the sunlight shining in, and Marcus feels the tension break. They sit in that coffee shop for hours, until the sun begins to turn rosy again, just talking. At one point, Sage reaches out and takes his hand, and then loses her mind laughing when his cheeks dimple in within two seconds. She doesn’t move her hand. When she drives him back to the safehouse, she drives slower, and he sits closer from the start. She walks him to the door.

“This is where I’d kiss you, if we were in a movie,” Sage lightly points out. It’s a joke, same as any other she’d made today, but it makes Marcus stop where he’d been fiddling with his keys. 

“Miss Prince,” He says, voice full of false incredulousness, “are you suggesting we do something improper?”

Sage flushes pink, slowly, the hue spreading delicately over her ears and cheeks. It’s cute. “No,” she says. “Of course not.”

She’s lying.

Later, when people ask about their first kiss, they won’t talk about this one. Not that there’s anything wrong with it—but it’s private. Personal. It’s between them. Kiss zero, as it will be called, goes something like this.

When Marcus steps forward, Sage does too. It’s a special kind of gravity, the one that pulls them into each other’s orbit. They stand for a second, simply existing together, and time seems to slow. They move in sync, like they’re dancing: his hand on her cheek, her hand on his shoulder. They’re still holding hands. He kisses her once, chastely, and Sage follows when he pulls away. It only lasted a few seconds, but it felt like forever. It felt like the blink of an eye. They stand together on the doorstep long after they’ve separated, foreheads pressed together.

“That was nice,” Marcus says softly, and she laughs. Steps away, but keeps his hand in hers.

“Yeah, nice.”

“I’ll text you?”

“You better. We should go on that date soon, okay?”

“Okay.”

Marcus watches her speed away with his hand still on the doorknob. He feels like he’s floating. Even though she’s gone, her afterimage still lingers: the sharply floral smell of her perfume in the air, the sweet taste of her chapstick on his lips. The day is finally starting to set in on him. He’d kissed Sage _._ She wanted to go on a date. She _liked him_! It’s almost too much for him. He stays outside for a long time, waiting for his head to stop spinning. When he finally steps inside, Alina is standing in the hallway, that familiar knowing grin curling across her face.

“Have a good time?” She asks, and doesn’t look surprised at all when he barely manages to respond with a mumbled affirmation before heading into his bedroom.

Marcus flops down into his bed and clutches a pillow to his chest. His cheeks are still dimpled in. The vibrant, warm light of the sunset is cutting through his blinds and painting his room in lovely shades of pink. It’s pretty. He watches as it fades, as his room grows dark, as his heartbeat finally slows. At 9:32 P.M, he texts Sage.

‘Want to get coffee next Saturday? My treat.’

And, three minutes later, she replies.

'It's a date!' 

**Author's Note:**

> i wrote all of this yesterday and then proofread and edited it in ten minutes. so like. if there's any errors that's my bad!


End file.
